Roseanne Barr was at the center of a social media storm on Tuesday after she sent a racist tweet that referred to “The Planet of the Apes” when mentioning a former top adviser to President Barack Obama who is black.

Activist and Intercept columnist Shaun King, claims that he’s spoken to “several NFL stars” who have told him that they’re “considering sitting out the season until the de facto ban on Eric Reid and Colin Kaepernick is removed.”

The report also claimed that the star players intended to “get 25% of the players to sit out with them.”

BREAKING: Several star @NFL players have told me they are considering sitting out the season until the de facto ban of Eric Reid and Colin Kaepernick is removed and both men are given spots back on rosters.

Should players choose to sit out it would almost have to be “star players” who do so, for the simple reason that they’re the only ones who could afford to do it. NFL teams can fine players up to $40,000 a day for missing camp, according to Pro Football Talk. Not to mention what the players might lose in endorsement money while protesting a policy that has a 53% approval rating.

I listen to the scanner daily, and over last few months I’ve been noticing an alarming trend. The number of 911 calls coming out of Salisbury Rehab & Nursing Center (Genesis) has to be taking an emense toll on available local EMS resources. SRNC is calling 911 over 10 times a day, and some days it’s close to 20. That is totally absurd. There’s no way that all those transports are true medical emergencies.

Just yesterday, I heard 2 ambulances go to SRNC for 2 diffent patients at the same time. Doing so depleted Salisbury’s ambulances (the others were responding to other real emergencies in the city), and therefore Salisbury had to call Hebron to assist answering calls in the city, and then Hebron got a call for a patient in cardiac arrest. The patient in cardiac arrest definitely had a delay in care as a direct result of SRNC calling 911 to transport patients that could otherwise be transported by a private ambulance company.

Private ambulances are there to transport patients between facilities, in both emergency and non-emergency situations. EMS personnel on private ambulances have the same training as their 911 counterparts. Private ambulances have the same equipment and capabilities as 911 ambulances.

The 911 EMS system was never designed to transport 10-20 patients a day from one facility to another. My tax money is not supposed to be used to bypass private ambulance companies.

This issue needs to be addressed before more people have a delay in care due to SRNC hogging the city’s available resources.

SALISBURY – Officials with the Wicomico County Sheriff’s Office made their requests for additional deputies, vehicles and more at a budget work session this week.

On Tuesday, representatives with the Wicomico County Sheriff’s Office came before the Wicomico County Council to make their case for additional funding in fiscal year 2019.

The proposed $151 million budget includes nearly $13 million – $7.9 million in salaries, more than $769,000 in operating expenses, $4,000 in one-time operating expenses and $412,800 in capital expenses – for the Wicomico County Sheriff’s Office.

Capt. Todd Richardson told the council the sheriff’s department was seeking a three-percent increase in its operating budget for the coming fiscal year to cover the costs of building maintenance and state-mandated bullet-proof vests. The department has also requested funding for four new deputy positions and eight new vehicles.

Not that I condone or support Rosanne's comments in any way, shape or form, it was absolutely out of line. However, there are many things said, Richard Prior, Rappers, Eddie Murphy and the list goes on and on and NOTHING was done to stop it. Heck, they keep running reruns of All In The Family. Do you remember M*A*S*H the movie and spearchucker? Blazing Saddles! Look at Pete Rose. The man has incredible records. He made an error in life and has been banned from the Hall of Fame for life. Yes, we have to curb such language and hate BUT we don't need corporate America or our Government crushing our First Amendment selectively. If you watch The View and see their every day bashing you have to think, how can they get away with such hate and attacks, yet they're still on the air. We as Americans need to simply STOP watching/supporting the very shows and music we do not agree with. It really is that simple. If Rosanne wants to act like a complete a-hole and you don't like it, stop watching. I certainly do not watch The View, do you?

On Monday night, a bar in Portland, Oregon hosted people of color and gave them $10 as they arrived — a symbolic gift funded primarily by white people who were asked not to attend the “Reparations Happy Hour.”

A local activist group, Brown Hope, wanted the event to be a space for people of color in a mostly white city to meet, organize, discuss public policy and potentially plan various actions.

The notion of full-scale reparations — sought by some as compensation for the horrors of slavery, Jim Crow and the large wealth gap between white and black U.S. households — was supported by 58 percent of black people and 46 percent of Hispanic people in a 2016poll.

However, 68 percent of white Americans do not support reparations; when the topic was brought up during the 2016 presidential campaign, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders said it was “divisive” and unlikely to get through Congress.

The economist Robert Browne once estimated a fair value for reparations of $1.4 trillion to $4.7 trillion and wrote that reparations should ''restore the black community to the economic position it would have had if it had not been subjected to slavery and discrimination.''

Residents, merchants and officials in Ellicott City on Monday began to examine the devastation wrought by floods that coursed through the historic mill town the night before _ the second time in less than two years.

Old Ellicott City's Main Street remained blocked off Monday, as crews walked up and down the street inspecting buildings. Police were looking for a man who was reported missing during the flooding Sunday. Cars were planted upside down and on their sides in streams and along the road, and a crane tow truck was brought in to lift them out. Utility workers began to restore power, fix a broken water line and bypass a broken sewer pipe.

Many quickly began to ask the question: Should we rebuild again?

At Tersiguel's French Country Restaurant, owner Michel Tersiguel knew immediately that he would repair and reopen his restaurant, a longtime destination restaurant for special occasions and French class field trips. He was on the phone with a contractor Sunday night.

"Time to rebuild, that's it," Tersiguel said. "It's no question for us. We rebuilt the building last time, so that helped. ... Our plan is to get it as soon as the county lets us in."

First and foremost, thank you all for your time and efforts in reviewing the upcoming FY19 budget for Wicomico County. Our membership understands how frustrating it can be to have requests placed in front of you that can't always be filled.

As we approach the beginning of FY 19, we all begin to wonder what the year will bring us. With fire and EMS call volume on the rise, the heroin epidemic growing out of control, mass shootings increasing, and a decrease in the amount of people wanting to volunteer in the community; we bring to question the concern of public safety through the eyes of the County Council. Last year when our membership approached the Council, we were told by most members, but primarily Council President Cannon, that there was nothing that could be done with funding us as County Executive Culver did not put us in the budget. Councilman Joe Holloway informed our membership that we needed to prove we could sustain ourselves for the next year and then he would see no issues with approving funding for our company. Councilman Ernie Davis concurred with this. All of this is documented in the recorded meetings of the County Council.

Our membership has fought long and hard over the past 16 months to continue serving the residents and tax payers of Wicomico County. While we have jumped every hurdle thrown in front of us, it still seems that the Council may not support improving the public safety of this County. This is based on recent information we received that you plan to cut us from the budget, in which Executive Culver placed us in.

We question the reason, if this is true, in which you would remove us from the budget based on what was told to us last year. If this is a result of disagreements with the Executive, then why should that have anything to do with public safety? The tit for tat of taking jabs at each other should never jeopardize the public safety of this County. Having the opportunity to improve public safety at such a low cost is extremely rare, if not unheard of. Why would any right minded person not take advantage of this situation?

It is unfortunate that it has taken this long for our organization to come to the point of final approval to serve the County. However, just so the Council is aware, we have been assisting the public in other ways. This includes food drives for HALO, water overflow removal for Wicomico Equestrian Center, free training and installation of kitchen fire extinguishers in county and city residences (no cost to the homeowner or occupant, no other department in the state offers this), free CPR training, and free installation of 10year sealed smoke detectors.

Our membership is here to make Wicomico County safer and to reduce damage caused by disasters. We hope that you support this same cause.

The 47 members of Company 13 hope to have the support of the County Council as we have continued to gain the support of our community over the past year.

Official documents obtained by the Washington Free Beacon contradict claims made by a House Democrat alleging he and his staff were "blocked" last week from attending a summit on chemicals hosted by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Rep. Dan Kildee (D.), who represents the city of Flint, Mich., and its surrounding areas, sent a letter on Thursday to EPA Inspector General Arthur Elkins accusing the EPA of wrongdoing in regards to the National Leadership Summit on Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS).

The summit, which convened state and federal regulatory officials to discuss how efforts at identifying and responding to PFAS—a class of potentially harmful man-made chemicals found in thousands of consumer products—could be improved, got off to a rough start when some media outlets, such as the Associated Press, were reportedly barred from attending.

In his letter, Kildee alleged the EPA attempted to restrict access to the summit for media outlets and members of Congress and asked the inspector general to conduct a formal investigation to determine if any federal laws "concerning open meetings and transparency" were violated by EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt and his staff.